Impressive
by TheNextFolchart
Summary: At the word "impressive," Sirius rolls his eyes. "Oh," he says. "I see. This is about Lily." / Before the flying motorcycle was Sirius', it belonged to a Potter.


**Impressive**

* * *

It's a Potter who owns it first.

"It was in the dump," James Potter says excitedly on the train ride back to school after the Christmas holiday. Peter and Remus don't seem interested, but Sirius is hanging on his every word. "It's _beautiful_."

"Does it run?" Sirius asks eagerly. "Can I have a ride?"

"It doesn't run yet," James admits. "But it will. I dragged it into the garage and let Dad have a look, he says the engine just needs fixing up."

"What kind of engine?" Sirius asks.

James shrugs. "I dunno. Who cares? I own a _motorcycle_."

Sirius leans back in his seat and folds his hands behind his head. "How're you going to fix it up if you don't know what kind of engine it is?"

James looks a little crestfallen. "Oh. I s'pose that makes sense."

"Take it to a muggle mechanic," Sirius advises, but James shakes his head.

"I'm doing it on my own. More impressive that way, eh?"

At the word _impressive_, Sirius rolls his eyes. "_Oh_," he says. "_I _see. This is about _Lily_."

James doesn't say anything, but the smile that inches across his face is answer enough.

* * *

He spends his entire Easter holiday working on the motorcycle, and he gets nowhere.

"I just don't understand," he says to Remus on the train ride back to Hogwarts - Sirius is absent, because McGonagall forced him to stay at Hogwarts over the Easter break and complete his massive number of detentions, and Peter stayed to keep him company. "There are so many pieces. How do the muggles comprehend it?"

"Well, what kind of engine is it?" Remus asks.

"How should I know?"

Remus raises his eyebrows. "You didn't look it up?"

"No."

"Did you look anything up?"

"No. I just sort of dived in." He shrugs. "I figured it couldn't be hard, if muggles had it figured out."

Remus smirks. "We'll do some research when we're back at school," he says as the compartment door slides open and Lily Evans slips inside.

"Research for what?" she asks, sitting down next to Remus.

"James is building a motorcycle."

"A motorcycle?" Lily wrinkles her nose. "Why?"

James blinks. "Why not?"

"They're horribly dangerous, for one," Lily says. "D'you have a death wish, Potter?"

"You don't think they're impressive?"

Lily squints at him, and then sighs as comprehension dawns. "If you're still trying to woo me, James, a motorcycle is not the way to go about it."

"No?" James looks a little defeated.

Lily shakes her head. "Not even close." She stands. "If you boys will excuse me, I see the candy trolley coming this way, and I'd like to catch it before James buys all the Fizzing Whizbees again."

"It happened _once_," James mutters, "and I offered to let you have one."

"Only if I kissed you first!"

"Details, details."

Lily rolls her eyes and leaves the compartment. When she's gone, James leans his head against the window. "So what the hell am I going to do with the beat-up motorcycle in my garage?"

"I'll take it off your hands," Remus offers. "I'd like to rebuild that engine. Seems like a good challenge."

So it's a Lupin who owns it next, and over the summer they wheel the motorcycle to Remus' house and park it in the garden shed.

* * *

It's a Pettigrew who gets it thirdhand, and he doesn't ask for it but it falls into his lap anyway.

"I just feel so useless," he says to Remus on the annual train ride home for Christmas - the very last one before they graduate. James and Sirius stayed at Hogwarts (Sirius has detentions to make up again, and James is too tangled up with Lily to even leave the common room), so it's only the two of them this trip. "We're never together anymore. James is busy with Lily, you're busy studying for your NEWTs, Sirius is skipping classes to do detentions, at this point - and I'm just on my own."

"Don't think of it like that, Wormy," Remus says, but Peter shakes his head.

"I mean it. I'm the outcast of our group. I'm not smart, Moony. I'm not a troublemaker - not really. I'm not the type of bloke who gets a girlfriend. I'm not impressive. I'm going nowhere." He puts his face in his hands and groans. "Hogwarts is going to be the highlight of my life. It's all downhill from here, isn't it."

"No, of course it isn't!" Remus says, and his heart twists as he looks at his friend.

(Because as much as Remus hates to admit it, Wormtail is _right_.)

"You know what you should do?" Remus says, leaning forward. "You should take the motorcycle."

Peter wrinkles his nose. "Why?"

"I worked on it all last summer, fixing the engine. It was very therapeutic. Made me feel worthwhile."

Peter lets out a half-hearted laugh. "What makes you think I'm smart enough to fix the bloody engine?"

"Not the engine - I already fixed the engine, it runs perfectly. But it needs a coat of paint." Remus shrugs. "You could get started on that. I can bring it round your place tonight, if you want."

Peter shrugs. "Fine. Can't hurt, I s'pose."

The conversation dissolves into other topics until the train pulls into the station. Remus promises to drop off the motorcycle as soon as he can; Peter digs through his garage until he finds a can of paint and a brush, and when Remus arrives with the bike, Peter gets to work.

He paints it carefully, one stroke at a time, doodling idle sketches and writing out words like "James" and "Sirius" and "impressive" and "friends" and "secrets" and "dark" and "mark" and the one name he's forbidden from saying aloud.

He paints late into the night, and when he's finished he goes over it all with a coat of glossy black and tries not to think about the brand on his arm that wasn't there this time last year.

* * *

It's a Black who owns it next, the summer after seventh year, when Hogwarts is over and they're on their very last train ride.

"Seven years ago," James says dreamily to the girl on his lap, "I asked you out right there in that aisle. And you turned me down and said not in a million years."

Lily raises her eyebrows. "_Six_ years ago, James, can't you count? Seven years ago I hadn't met you. Seven years ago I didn't even have my Hogwarts letter yet."

"One year ago you were bragging about your bloody motorcycle," Sirius says.

"More like a year and a half, actually," Peter says, and Sirius sends him a rude hand gesture.

"Where'd that bike end up?" Sirius asks.

James shrugs. "Gave it to Moony."

"I gave it to Peter," Remus says.

"I still have it," Peter says. "It's at home. It's all fixed up now. Mum won't let me ride it, though. Too dangerous."

"You have a wise mother, Peter," Lily says while Sirius rolls his eyes.

"Can I have it, Pete?" Sirius asks. "My mum doesn't care about my safety, she'd probably be glad if I died."

Peter smirks. "It's all yours."

Lily sighs. "Only way it could possibly be more dangerous is if the damn thing could fly."

Sirius' eyes light up. "_Brilliant_," he says as the train pulls into King's Cross. "Evans, you're a _genius_."

Lily puts her face in her hands. "You have an idiot for a best friend," she says to James as the five of them stand up and make their ways into the aisle.

"A flying motorcycle," Sirius says once they're safely on the platform. "That's going to be _so impressive_."

"It can't be that difficult," Remus says. "A simple levitating spell. Maybe a feather-light charm."

Sirius is grinning and bouncing like a child. "I could do it tonight at Wormtail's and fly the thing back to my place."

(That's exactly what he does.)

* * *

It belongs to a Hagrid for a brief period of time; he borrows it for a night and brings it back, just like he promises, to the Black. After that it's owned by a Weasley, who confiscates it after the Black goes to Azkaban He stows it in his tool shed and takes it apart and puts it together and tries to replicate its effects on the Ford Anglia in his garage. It bounces back to the Black when he gets out of prison, then to the Hagrid for one more borrowed night, then to the Weasley again when it crashes and falls apart into the state it was when it was originally dragged home from the dump.

But it ends up where it began: in the hands of a Potter.

"Sirius left everything to you in his will, after all," Arthur Weasley says as he gives the bike a little push toward Harry. "I fixed it up, gave it a coat of paint. It's an impressive piece of machinery." He looks at it fondly. "Now it's time you take it back."

The Potter runs his palm over the handlebars. When he looks up at the Weasley, his eyes are brimming with tears he doesn't understand. "Thank you."

* * *

_[Disney Character Competition: John and Michael Darling - write about the Marauders]_

_[Greek Mythology Prompt Challenge: Oceanus - write about the Marauders]_

_[New Years Resolution Challenge: Write about Sirius getting his motorcycle]_


End file.
